


will you fight (or will you walk away)

by shineyma



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Betrayal, Comfort/Angst, Established Relationship, F/M, Post-Episode: s01e20 Nothing Personal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 18:40:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4030450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shineyma/pseuds/shineyma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been a bad day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	will you fight (or will you walk away)

**Author's Note:**

> I know, I know: ANOTHER fic in the Nothing Personal/Ragtag timeframe? Get a new shtick, Amy. But! This one is, I think, a little different than my others. So give it a try, maybe?
> 
> Other things you might be annoyed about include my continuing failure to respond to comments. I'm so sorry, I'm the worst. I can't promise it'll happen anytime soon, but I'll do my best.
> 
> Title is from Red's _Let it Burn_. Thanks for reading and, as always, please be gentle if you review!

It’s been a bad day.

For all of them.

They all linger by the pool after the sun sets. Occasionally, someone attempts conversation, but for the most part, they sit in silence. The enormity of what’s happened—not just today, but this whole horrible week—hangs in the air, heavy and unspoken.

Their worlds have been shattered.

But as bad as the week has been, it’s been twice as long. They’re all exhausted, and the urge to stay together—to witness with their own eyes that none of the others have been snatched away—cannot outweigh the need for sleep.

In the end, Jemma and Skye are left alone in silence, and even that doesn’t last forever.

“So,” Skye says eventually, clapping her hands together. “Ready for bed, roomie?”

“Oh, I don’t think so.” Jemma does her best to smile. “You go on, Skye. I think I’ll stay out here for a while longer.”

“You sure?” Skye asks. She’s already on her feet, but she makes a move as though she might sit down again. “If you want company, I don’t mind…”

“I’m certain,” she promises. “It’s been a long day. Go on to bed; I’ll be in shortly.”

She won’t, really, but she’s counting on Skye’s exhaustion to overwhelm her before she realizes that Jemma has no intention of joining her.

“Well,” Skye looks between Jemma and the door to their room, hesitant, “If you’re sure…”

“Go to bed, Skye,” Jemma orders gently.

“Okay,” she says, holding her hands up. “But if you change your mind, you know where to find me.”

“I do,” she says.

“Okay.”

Instead of heading for their room, however, Skye rounds her chair to join Jemma at the poolside.

“You’re gonna be okay, you know,” she says, crouching to wrap her arms around Jemma’s shoulders. “I know if doesn’t feel like it right now, but—you’re strong. You’re gonna be okay.”

Tears burn at Jemma’s eyes, but she does her best to ignore them—she’s done enough crying already.

“Thank you, Skye,” she says, twisting to hug her properly. “That means—well. I appreciate it.”

Skye squeezes her tightly, then lets go and gets to her feet, retreating to their room without another word. Jemma swallows and turns back to face the pool.

That’s not the first time today she’s had that exchange. It’s not even the first time this hour. Everyone was reluctant to leave her side—as they retired to their rooms, one by one, each would eye the remaining others in a silent order to watch over her.

She appreciates it—more than she can say—but she doesn’t need company right now.

What she _needs_ is some time to herself—some time to think—and everyone knows it. That they’ve done her the courtesy of pretending they don’t means the world to her, because she’s enough emotion rattling around in her chest without adding their concern on top of it.

Grant is HYDRA.

It’s been nearly a full day, but it hasn’t quite sunk in yet. The phrase—the very thought—still seems so absurd. How can Grant— _Grant_ , who frets over every paper-cut she gets, who makes her tea when she’s ill, who took so long to get up the nerve to _tell_ her that he loved her, but made sure to _show_ her in every possible way—how can the man she loves, the man she _married_ , be capable of the behavior Skye described?

In all their years together, she’s never doubted him. Not once. Even knowing that he’s a professional liar and killer—that he could deceive her as easily as she can name the elements of the Periodic Table—that the hands he so gently touches her with have been used to end countless lives—even knowing full well that he’s a specialist, and knowing exactly what it means—she has never, ever doubted him.

The undeniable evidence that she _should_ have is a bitter pill to swallow.

She catches the light in the window of her room go out in her peripheral vision and exhales slowly.

She lied to Skye. She has no intention of going inside.

It’s not because she doesn’t want to sleep. She does; she’s exhausted. But the room she and Skye are sharing has two double beds, and the idea of crawling beneath the covers and feeling all that empty space next to her makes her heart hurt. Not that she hasn’t slept alone since she married Grant—on the contrary, she’s done it often. But always before, she’s had the expectation that the empty space would be filled eventually.

She can’t face the idea that she might spend the rest of her life sleeping alone. Not tonight.

So she stays by the pool.

The temperature drops as the hours pass, and dangling her feet in the water becomes uncomfortably cold; after a while, she stands and moves to sit on one of the lounge chairs instead. She stretches out on it, staring up at the dark sky; in downtown LA, there are no stars to speak of—not celestial ones, anyway—and there’s something comforting about it, about the moon being the only focal point.

She’s exhausted, and reclining on the lounge chair is close enough to lying down that she has difficulty keeping her eyes open. The chill to the air helps a little, but it’s not enough to keep her awake—not after the week she’s had.

She falls asleep with her hands tucked into her sleeves and her cheek pressed into the cold plastic of the lounge chair.

\---

She wakes wrapped in very familiar arms.

She wishes she didn’t remember why it’s odd, that she could enjoy—if only for a moment—the steady beat of his heart beneath her ear and the comforting scent of his soap and the easy strength behind his gentle hold on her. But she does and she can’t.

She also, however, can’t bring herself to shove him away. She wonders if he’d let her if she tried—wonders what she’d do if he didn’t—and decides it’s best not to find out. Besides, she was so cold when she fell asleep and it’s nice, now, to be so warm.

And that’s not just body heat. Her front is warm because she’s pressed up against him, but her back is warm, too. A jacket—his jacket—is wrapped around her shoulders.

She doesn’t know why that makes her want to cry.

“I know you’re awake,” he says quietly, and with the way she’s lying half on top of him, the words rumble in her chest just as much as his. She sighs.

“Hello, Grant,” she says, without opening her eyes.

“Hello, Jemma.” She can hear a smile in his voice.

She doesn’t know why she’s not surprised that he’s here. Surely he should be on his way to wherever he and Garrett are based, ready to turn the newly-unlocked hard drive full of her research over. And, putting that aside, how could he even know where they’re staying? Of all the motels in Los Angeles, how could he _possibly_ know that they would be at this one?

So she should be surprised that he’s here.

But she’s not.

“So,” he says, fingers playing over the vulnerable skin at the nape of her neck. Jemma suppresses a shudder. “No room at the inn?”

“What?”

She opens her eyes to look at him. It’s still dark—she can’t have been asleep for long—but there’s enough lighting around the pool to see him by. He looks…like himself, really. He’s still battered from the Hub and the Fridge (or whatever _actually_ caused his injuries; she supposes he must have been part of the invading force at the Fridge, so it’s not likely he received them there), and he’s gone a bit past five o’clock shadow, but…

He looks like Grant—not at all like a mass murderer and very much like her husband.

“Why are you sleeping in a pool chair?” he clarifies. “Not that I don’t appreciate being spared the effort of breaking into every single room trying to find you, but I assume there’s a perfectly good bed waiting for you somewhere.”

“There is,” she agrees.

“So why aren’t you in it?” he asks.

“It’s a nice night,” she says. “I wanted to enjoy it.”

He smiles, wide and amused. “That’s a lie.”

“Yes,” she admits. But she doesn’t want to admit the real reason—that it was his absence that kept her from her bed—and so she changes the subject. “What are you doing here, Grant?”

“It’s a nice night,” he says, tone playfully mocking. “Maybe I wanted to enjoy it, too.”

She starts to sit up, and the arm around her waist tightens in warning. She stills.

“Careful,” he says, and withdraws his arm. “You chose a really narrow bed. Wouldn’t want to fall.”

“Right.”

Sitting up does take some doing, because there’s not much space on the chair. She ends up sitting sideways across his lap, her back to one arm rest, her knees bent, and her feet resting between his hip and the other arm rest.

Without his body heat to warm her, it’s harder to ignore the chill in the night air. She wraps his jacket more firmly around herself and tries to ignore the satisfied smile it puts on his face.

It occurs to her, belatedly, that she could have just left the chair entirely. She could have moved to one of the others, or—if she were truly as smart as everyone thinks—she could have run for her motel room. Even if he didn’t let her get away, she could have raised enough of a fuss to draw the others out of their rooms. She still could, actually. She _should_.

She doesn’t.

But the silence between them is too comfortable. She can’t stand it.

“Why are you here?” she asks. “Really?”

“For you, of course,” he says. He has one hand resting on her thigh, casually possessive, and he squeezes it gently. “We have a lot to talk about.”

“Do we?” she asks. “I don’t think there’s much to say at all.”

“Really?” He raises his eyebrows. “Four years of marriage and there’s nothing you wanna say to me?”

“Nothing that will do any good,” she amends.

“Getting it off your chest is good,” he says. He rubs his other hand up her back, encouraging. “Come on, baby. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

The endearment is the last straw; she can’t hold the words back. “You’re _HYDRA_. How could you—of all possible things, how could work for HYDRA? For _Nazis_?”

“John works for HYDRA,” he says. “I work for John.” He shrugs. “Transitive property, right? It’s just business.”

She wants to address the sheer absurdity of that defense, but it will have to wait. Now that she’s started, she can’t stop herself from sharing the entire litany that’s been playing in her head all day.

“You’re a traitor,” she says. “A liar. A murderer—”

“You knew that already,” he interrupts, and her voice sticks in her throat. “You’ve known that for years.”

“Not like this,” she says. “Not like personally performing a post-mortem on a man you killed—a man who’d done nothing but offer us shelter in our time of need.”

Grant’s face darkens. “Coulson made _you_ do the autopsy? Of all the fucking cruel—”

She can’t quite seem to get enough oxygen; emotion makes her breath short as her eyes sting with tears.

“Who else was there?” she demands. “It’s not as though we brought along a medical examiner—”

“Trip could have done it,” he says. “You think your on-the-go medical training makes you better at identifying cause of death than a specialist? It doesn’t.” His voice softens. “Coulson was making a point, Jem. He was trying to upset you.”

“And you think him ordering me to examine Koenig’s body is worse than you killing him in the first place?”

“It’s not like it’s the first time you’ve had it shoved in your face that I’m a killer,” he reminds her. “What makes this time different?”

She swallows, with difficulty. She knows precisely what he’s talking about, and the memory makes her throat tight.

She surprised him once, at the Sandbox. He returned from assignment in the middle of the day and detoured to their quarters to shower before his debrief, assuming that she’d be in the labs. But she’d taken a sick day for her horrible headache, and therefore was present to see him walk in the door, all but covered in blood.

“I came home dripping blood all over the carpet,” he says. “And all you did was help me shower.” His hand leaves her thigh to cup her chin, gently forcing her to make eye contact. “You’ve always known what I’m capable of doing, sweetheart—what I’m _good_ at doing. Does who I’m doing it for really make that much of a difference?”

It should. It absolutely should.

But she doesn’t know that it does.

It’s a dilemma, and not one she imagines she’ll find a solution to anytime soon. She was hoping to have time to think it through before seeing Grant again; she should have known fate wouldn’t be that kind.

She looks into his face—beloved and patient—and she can’t lie. Not to him.

“I don’t know,” she admits. “I don’t know anything anymore.”

He sighs and wraps an arm around her shoulders, guiding her to lean against his side. She doesn’t fight it—quite the opposite, she curls willingly into him.

He’s a murderer (but he’s always been a murderer) and a liar (that, too) and, worst of all, a traitor.

But she loves him.

Perhaps she should feel a threat in his touch, but she doesn’t. His arms around her mean comfort and safety and love, not danger.

She could live to be as old as Elliot Randolph and she doesn’t think she’d ever accept there might be reason to fear Grant. It’s just…unthinkable. Absurd.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly, and she closes her eyes. “This isn’t how I wanted you to find out.”

“You mean me stumbling upon the corpse of a man you killed wasn’t in your plans?” she asks dryly.

“Did _you_ find him?” he asks.

“Yes, I did,” she says. “I was going to make pancakes and then there was blood on the wall, and…”

She swallows against the bile rising in her throat. She’s never been the squeamish sort—how could she be, with the sort of work she does?—but the memory of Agent Koenig’s shredded throat is enough to make her queasy.

“I’m sorry,” he repeats. “I didn’t want that.”

She opens her eyes and tilts her head back to look at him. “What did you want?”

“To ease you into it,” he says. He ghosts his fingers along her cheek, then drops his hand to rest on her thigh again. “Give you some time to adjust.”

“You think this is something I can _adjust_ to?” she asks, incredulous. “To you being the enemy?”

“Never know unless you try,” he shrugs.

She fiddles with the hem of his shirt, eyes stinging. “And if I don’t want to try?”

“I can’t force you,” he says, a touch regretfully. “But…either way, you’re gonna have to make a choice eventually, baby.”

She knows precisely what he’s talking about, and it sparks anger in her—though not, she thinks, as much as it should.

“Why?” she demands. “Why me? Why don’t _you_ have to make a choice?”

“Because your conscience will demand it,” he says, tone almost apologetic. “And mine won’t.”

She sits up. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that I’ve got no problem working for HYDRA _and_ being with you,” he says. “But I don’t think you can say the same.”

He’s right. She can’t.

“That doesn’t mean it needs to be me who makes the choice,” she says. She looks down at his hand on her thigh and rubs her thumb against his wedding ring. “You could leave HYDRA—leave John. Then I wouldn’t need to make a choice.”

“You want me to betray John?” he asks, voice unreadable.

“Why not?” she asks. “You’ve already betrayed me.”

He breathes out a laugh and tugs her to lean against him once more.

“No, I haven’t,” he says. “But I get your point.”

They’re silent for a moment. Sirens wail in the distance.

Jemma’s heart is crumbling in her chest, and the pieces are in her lungs, impeding her breathing.

He’s right that her conscience demands a choice. Unfortunately, there’s only one choice that her conscience will allow.

“I could leave SHIELD,” she whispers. She can barely hear her own voice over the rushing in her ears. “But I can’t leave Fitz.”

It’s more than Fitz. It’s Skye and Coulson and May and Trip. It’s what’s _right_ —it’s the fact that she can do good working for organizations other than SHIELD, but he will only ever be able to do evil whilst working for HYDRA.

But she can’t possibly express all of that without breaking down. So the simplified version will have to do.

Grant lets out a ragged breath. He knows what she isn’t saying.

There’s plenty he isn’t saying, himself, when he drops a kiss to the top of her head and murmurs, “I could leave HYDRA. But I can’t leave John.”

Her tears well over, and she turns her face into his shoulder to hide them. He must feel them, though, because his hold on her tightens significantly.

It does nothing for the gaping hollowness in her chest.

“I suppose—” Her voice catches on a sob, and Grant tenses. “I suppose there’s only one thing for it, then.”

“Don’t say it,” he orders, voice heavy. “You’re right, but…don’t say it.”

She nods against his shoulder and keeps her mouth shut. It’s just as well. She’s not sure she’s physically capable of giving voice to what they both know:

They’re over.

For several long moments, they sit in silence. She keeps her hands fisted in her lap as she struggles with her tears; she fears that if she starts touching him, she’ll never be able to stop. Grant’s fingers are digging into her skin, but she welcomes the pain. It’s something else to focus on—something else to think about—and if she has bruises tomorrow, all the better.

Something to remember him by.

His heart is racing beneath her ear, and the sign that he, too, is affected, brings a new question to the forefront.

“How much of it was real?” she asks.

She doesn’t know whether she truly wants to know—whether the answer she dreads will make letting go of him easier or more difficult—but she has to ask.

“Depends on what you mean by _it_ ,” he says, tone perfectly casual; if she didn’t know how fast his heart is racing, she would never guess. “If you mean my cover, not much. I’m nowhere near as nice—or as awkward—as that guy.”

“Or as moral,” she offers. As far as jokes go, it’s weak (and not something she should be joking about at all, really), but he chuckles a little anyway.

“Right,” he says. “Or that.” His fingers flex on her skin. “But if you mean our marriage…”

“I do,” she confirms quietly.

“It was as real as I could make it.” This time, his voice is rough. “I love you, Jemma. That wasn’t a lie.”

It hurts—so badly that she can’t even breathe, for a moment. She presses a hand to her mouth, but it barely muffles the gasping sob that slips out despite her best efforts.

Grant swears under his breath, and his hand leaves her thigh to cup her cheek.

“Don’t,” he pleads, and he sounds so wrecked that she simply can’t resist the urge to hug him any longer.

It’s a bad angle for it, though. She shifts to straddle him, knees on either side of his legs, and she’s no sooner stopped moving than he grasps the back of her neck and drags her into a kiss. She clings to him as she returns it, and it’s—

It’s painful. Everything hurts. His hand sliding up her back, his fingers in her hair, the sheer desperation in the kiss—every second of it is another knife in her heart.

She’s still crying.

Breaking the kiss—pulling back from him—is the hardest thing she’s ever done. It’s harder than throwing herself from the Bus, than saying goodbye every time he left for assignment—harder even than opening her mouth and speaking the words, “Grant did this,” back at Providence.

His face is set as he looks at her, but his eyes are full of emotion, and if her heart weren’t already broken, what she sees there would tear it in two.

“I love you, too,” she says, and he closes his eyes briefly.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“So am I.”

He takes a deep breath, then squeezes her thighs once, a silent signal.

It’s time for him to go.

She’s unsteady as she slides off the lounge chair, but by some miracle, she manages to keep her feet. It doesn’t comfort her any that Grant looks somewhat unsteady himself as he stands.

She has her answer: knowing that his feelings were genuine makes this a thousand times worse.

As soon as he’s on his feet, she throws herself into his arms for a proper hug.

One last, proper hug before she says goodbye.

His arms are warm and solid and so, so familiar that she has no hope of stopping her tears—nor of loosening her own hold on him, for all that she knows she must be hurting his cracked ribs. For her own sake, she tells herself that it’s that pain causing the stutter in his breathing.

“I love you,” he says, quietly, as he presses a kiss to her hair. “Tell Coulson that if he gets you hurt, I’ll kill him.”

“I love you,” she returns. “And you may tell John that if anything happens to you, I will shoot him. Twice. Possibly in the stomach, simply for poetic justice.”

He laughs, just a little, and squeezes her tightly.

Then he lets go and steps back.

“Be safe, Jemma,” he says.

“You, too.” With reluctance, she slides his jacket off; she’d like to keep it, but she would have no way to explain its presence without telling the others of this encounter. And she knows _that_ would end badly. “Here.”

He takes it and pulls it on, and even as it settles on his shoulders, a mask settles over his features.

“I’m not kidding,” he tells her lightly. “You get even a scratch and Coulson’ll be begging to be stabbed through the heart again.”

“I might shoot John either way,” she admits, playing along.

He grins, sharp and lovely, and presses a swift, sweet kiss to her forehead.

“I’ll be seeing you,” he says—and then he’s gone, striding through the gate and into the night.

“I hope not,” she murmurs to herself, watching him go.

His absence leaves her cold. She only lasts a few moments more before her shivering forces her inside, into the room where Skye is sleeping peacefully in the bed near the door.

The sight of the other bed, the one meant for Jemma—large and empty—knocks the breath right out of her lungs, and the door closes much more loudly than she intends.

Skye startles awake. “What— _Jemma_.”

She’s still crying, she realizes. That’s what put that tone, that soft sympathy, in Skye’s voice.

But she can’t stop. Staring at the empty bed, knowing that her bed will _always_ be empty, that the man she loves is lost to her forever—

How can she do _anything_ but cry?

She falls back against the door and slides to the ground, sobbing in earnest.

Skye is there in seconds, kneeling next to her and pulling her into her arms, and Jemma clings with all her might.

“It’s okay, Jemma,” Skye promises, sounding rather tearful herself. “You’re gonna be okay.”

“No,” Jemma says, tears so thick in her throat she fears she’ll choke on them. “No, I won’t.”

She can’t be.


End file.
